July 7 (Bloomberg) -- Envoys of the 15 members of the
United Nations Security Council have agreed to send 7,000
soldiers and 900 police to the oil-rich Republic of South Sudan
to provide security for the new nation, two UN diplomats said.

The Security Council is likely to vote tomorrow to adopt a
U.S.-drafted resolution authorizing the peacekeeping deployment
for 12 months, according to the two diplomats, who requested
anonymity because the agreement was reached in closed talks
yesterday.

South Sudan will declare its independence from Sudan on
July 9 and assume control of about 75 percent of Sudan’s daily
oil production of 490,000 barrels. The crude, pumped mainly by
China National Petroleum Corp., Malaysia’s Petroliam Nasional
Bhd and India’s Oil & Natural Gas Corp., is exported through a
pipeline that runs to Port Sudan on the Red Sea. Oil earnings
accounted for about 98 percent of South Sudan’s 2010 budget.

“This is a fragile and fraught moment,” U.S. Ambassador
Susan Rice, who will lead the American delegation to the
independence ceremony, told reporters in Washington today. “It
cannot, and must not, be taken for granted, least of all by the
government of Sudan and the government of the Republic of South
Sudan, who will have to still work exceptionally hard to achieve
an enduring peace and enable the emergence of two viable states
that are peaceful neighbors.”

‘Extremely Concerned’

Most of the 7,900 peacekeepers will be drawn from the
10,500 soldiers and police currently deployed in Sudan to
monitor the cease-fire that ended a two-decade civil war in the
region. About 2,500 now stationed on the northern side of what
will become the border between two nations will be withdrawn.
The government in Khartoum hasn’t agreed to allow any UN
peacekeepers to stay north of the border.

Rice said the U.S. was “extremely concerned” by Sudan’s
decision to compel the withdrawal of the 2,500 UN troops from
the South Kordofan and Blue Nile states north of the border,
which have been the scene of recent fighting.

“It’s vital that the United Nations be allowed to maintain
a full peacekeeping presence in these areas for an additional
period of time in order to facilitate the distribution of
humanitarian aid, support the implementation of any cessation of
hostilities agreement, and vitally, to protect civilians,” Rice
said.

Weapons Flow

The draft resolution authorizing the new mission calls for
it to monitor any flow of weapons across the border with Sudan,
protect civilians in the new nation and assist the development
of South Sudan’s government. Questions about the necessity for
as many as 7,900 uniformed personnel caused diplomats to put a
provision in the resolution mandating a review of the troop
strength after three months.

The Security Council voted on June 27 to deploy 4,200
Ethiopian soldiers to the disputed border area of Abyei to allow
for the withdrawal of Sudanese and South Sudanese troops.
Sudan’s army seized the main town in Abyei on May 21 after
accusing South Sudan of attacking its forces. The Ethiopian
troops, separate from the 7,900-member peacekeeping force, will
remain in the Abyei area.

“A permanent resolution of Abyei’s status is still
elusive, and the situation there, in spite of an agreement on
temporary security arrangements signed on June 20th and the
imminent deployment of a UN interim security force for Abyei, is
still extremely volatile,” Rice said. “An estimated 100,000
people have been displaced from their homes in Abyei.”